Bluetooth SIG Attacks Linux Bluetooth List

Karma Sucks writes "As reported in the latest free edition of LWN the Bluetooth Qualification Administrator has demanded that the Linux BlueZ project take down the highly-useful Bluetooth hardware compatibility list for Linux with the intimation that 'As neither of these products have been qualified using Linux it is illegal to make them available for public use'. This was apparently done at the request of a registered member of the Bluetooth SIG. Anyone know who this member was?"

"unofficial"

[198TFour]

easy - cant they just rename it the "unofficial compatibility list" and put in some "this is nto official bla bla bla in small print" or better yet - tell the bluetooth peopel to get lost

What product are we talking about?

[PSaltyDS]

I may be missing something obvious, as I never used this list before seeing this article, but I didn't understand the statement:

"...a registered member of the Bluetooth SIG complained about the non-qualified use of Bluetooth products on this page..."

The cynic in me ASSUMES "member" is Microsoft, but my inner cynic is sometimes wrong. My question is what "Bluetooth products" were on that page? To be "on the page" implies text or a list, not a device. Did the BlueZ page copy some table or something from a Bluetooth source? It might have helped if he had posted the whole complaint, not just this statement, but maybe he lawyer-beaten into only posting that much.

"Whether or not you're selling them makes no difference."

Selling what? As I understand it, this was just a compatibility list. What might they have been selling-yet weren't.

"The problem is due to the distribution of them from your Web site."

Again, what are "them" that they are distributing, but not selling?

"Please note that the use and distribution of non-qualified products is a violation of the Bluetooth License Agreement."

Once more, what products? This hints at calling things "Bluetoth" that are not, which would be a trademark issue, I guess. But what product are they talking about?

"As neither of these products have been qualified using Linux it is illegal to make them available for public use."

'Neither' means two 'products' have not been 'qualified' (by Bluetooth SIG, I gather), but what products and how are they illegal? I was looking for something like a claim to be "Bluetooth" without permission, but is that what the BlueZ list did? If so, how does that become a takedown instead of a rewording? For example, if they had said "The following devices are Bluetooth certified on Linux", they could just say "The following devices, which are Bluetooth certified under other operating systems, work under Linux too, though that is not certified by the Bluetooth SIG."